


Fate / Grimoire

by SnowSetAfire



Category: Drag-On Dragoon | Drakengard, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms, Nier Gestalt | Nier
Genre: Crossover
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-17
Updated: 2020-02-25
Packaged: 2020-03-06 16:45:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18855019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnowSetAfire/pseuds/SnowSetAfire
Summary: The Fifth Grail War arrived unexpectedly and ended in disaster.  Now in 2026, the Sixth Grail War begins and Rin Tohsaka has her chance to set right what went wrong over twenty years ago- if the other participants don't get their hands on the Grail first.





	1. Rin I

She would always remember that day-- the day when a dragon fell from the sky, when snow fell in summer. Rin counted the years as she watched the deserted streets of Tokyo for trouble. Twenty-three years since that day. Twenty-two since the last Grail War. Now another Grail War loomed. The thought brought tears to her eyes. This time, it would be different. The last had been different than any Grail War she could have expected, but this time she would win.

Rin was heading home. Not to her ancestral home in Fuyuki, but her new one in Tokyo. Not that it was easy to get there. Who would want to leave the safety of struggling, poor, overcrowded Kyushu, unless they had to? Honshu was closer to an apocalyptic hellscape, and it got only worse as Rin drew farther away from Fuyuki and closer to Tokyo. Cities crumbled from years of abandonment and the endless fighting between soldiers and Legion. Rin had stayed close to the Hamelin outposts, hating them as much as she needed their supplies of fresh food and water. Every one of the soldiers had eyed her warily. Rin was ancient in a land where most did not survive to adulthood. 

She clutched the red pendant of her necklace closely. After how the last Grail War ended, she had been hesitant, for all her bravado, to return to Tokyo so quickly. Even now she hesitated, slowing pace as she approached the apartment she had taken in the mostly-abandoned neighborhood nearby. She could have summoned her Servant in Fuyuki, but that was no longer a seat of magical power. The ley lines had shifted when the dragon fell from the sky, when it fought a grotesque giant only to be shot down by human weapons. What was once Shinjuku was now a mass of ley lines drawn through where Tokyo tower used to stand. If she had one wish, it would be a chance to see either of Saber or Archer again. It was a wish she felt she would need the Grail to accomplish, and yet she would have to squander on a greater goal.

The sky was a bright, pearly grey as Rin climbed the outside steps to her apartment, even though her watch told her it was past midnight. That was not unusual anymore. Night had not fallen over Japan in over two decades, not since that day. In some ways, it was a blessing. It was hard to fear walking around late when it never got dark. Now, she picked up her pace and cursed the omnipresent sun. If she didn’t hurry, she would miss the strongest tide of mana and her best chance of summoning a strong enough Servant to win.

When she entered her apartment with a jingle of keys, Rin cast off her coat in a pile to the side of the door and kicked off her shoes roughly, barely breaking stride as she made her way with two heavy bags of ritual materials to the large bedroom she had repurposed for the summoning ritual. Along the way she navigated through stacks of old books she had taken with her from Fuyuki. There had not been enough space to begin with to install enough shelving to house them all. Then she had no time to put back the ones she removed for study. One more week, Rin promised herself, and she would have time to put away the books and moving boxes and the piling trash and laundry. The offending mess was far less important than what lay ahead.

Rin checked her watch once more as she set up the ritual space. Outside the sky would always be bright grey. The inside of the interior bedroom was more often than not pitch dark. As Rin prepared, mindful of time slipping through her fingers, it began to glow with the soft light of candles and the pungent, spicy smell of incense. The candles cast a flickering silhouette of Rin against the walls and ceiling that darted this way and that. A part of her wanted to laugh, but she grit her teeth to bite back the memory of the last time she had cast this spell for real. She could still remember every element, the feel of mana flowing through her and the sound of her slight mispronunciations. It had been the effort of a child—crude, pure, and arrogant. This time would be different.

The time had come. Rin began her chant, commanding a Heroic Spirit to answer her call. She could feel mana course through her body, at times cold, at times warm, at times tingling like electricity. The pendant that she had once used as a catalyst to conjure Archer to her side reflected the light of the ritual and responded with its own. The scabbard she had rescued long ago to serve her now as a more potent catalyst for the Saber-class Servant she had desired shimmered. The words of the ritual dripped off of Rin’s tongue in a syrupy contralto that resonated in her chest.

“Hello? Is anyone there!?” a young man’s voice called out from the living room.

Rin fought to retain control of her magic. She was so close, she thought in a panic. If she failed utterly, she would make sure that this intruder would pay. The mana flowing through her sputtered as Rin heard footsteps drawing close to her ritual room. It was impossible, she thought, straining to regain the ritual’s power even as she could feel it collapsing around her. She must have left the front door ajar in her haste, but even then, she had set up so many wards to ensure she would not be disturbed.

With a creak, the door to her ritual room opened. All the power Rin had fought to create turned dead and ice-cold in her veins. Her cheeks burned with rage at the young man who stood in front of her and the little girl that clung to him.

“You idiot!” She screamed at him. “I was so close!”

His innocent eyes grew wide with shock and embarrassment as if he had walked in on Rin changing clothes. Rin suddenly considered that he might not be so innocent after all. He had barged in. He must be a formidable mage if he had been able to ignore her barriers in the way he had. A mage like that would be a likely participant in the Grail War. It was only a pity that he had the little girl with them. Rin steeled her heart as she readied a spell. If she had been as ruthless as her father in the beginning, she thought, she might have won the first time.

Magic bloomed out of Rin’s hands, deadly petals of flame that shot towards the intruders. Their white-blond hair was bathed in a red glow. As suddenly as it appeared, the fireball was torn apart like cherry blossoms in a strong wind before it even struck them. A new figure interposed itself between Rin and the intruders, gripping the hilt of her sword tightly. Above the crossguard, where there should have been a blade, was only the shimmering suggestion of one in the air. Rin knew her at once and knew her summoning had once more failed to achieve the desired effect.

“Saber!?” Rin cried in a mix of despair and relief. If Saber was defending this stranger, it meant that she was his Servant, not hers. If she was defending this stranger, it meant that somewhere out there, Shirou was still alive after all this time. They had made a pact, as Angelus had urged. The death of Shirou would mean the final death of Arturia as well. At the back of her mind, Rin wondered if the entire point of her ritual had only ended in the summoning of an adversary. She would not have enough mana to attempt to summon a strong Servant a second time.

Saber’s eyes widened at Rin’s recognition. She hadn’t aged a bit, not that Rin expected her to. Magecraft had slowed Rin’s own aging a little, but lines still haunted her face. Saber still did not look a day over fifteen. Saber opened her mouth to speak, but Rin cut her off.

“Stand down.” Rin ordered as if she had command spells to wield against Saber, “If you are both going to be my adversaries, this Grail War hasn’t yet started. Nor is it right to fight outside Jericho.”  
“Jericho?” Saber asked.  
“Grail War?” The boy asked simultaneously.  
Rin frowned. Again, some idiot boy would be in her care. At least this time, she didn’t already love him. He was far too young for her anyway.  
“I guess the night is still young, isn’t it?” Rin said as she stood up. She gestured to the boy and the little girl at his side, waving them away, “You should be ashamed, walking into a lady’s room like that. Can’t be helped. You’re in this now, I might as well let you know what you’ve done to yourself. Find someplace in the living room and I’ll explain.”  
“I’m sorry.” The young man blushed, “Yonah and I were looking for food. When we saw you climbing the stairs, we thought you might have some. Our parents were survivors two cities over. They got WCS and turned us away.”  
If they were words meant to gain sympathy, it worked. They would not have parents now, not for long. They’d succumb to White Chlorination Syndrome, one way or another. If there was a kind God, He’d let them turn to pillars of salt and not into red-eyed, unthinking berserkers. If He was kinder still, they might be casualties of the Grail War before either fate befell them.  
“Do you need tea or anything?” Rin asked as she started up the kettle in her kitchen. The boy and the girl Rin assumed was named Yonah had taken places on the loveseat, and Saber stood at the boy’s side, waiting with one eye on the glass door to the balcony and the other on the front door. Rin checked the back of her hand. Command seals marked it like angry red burns. So she had a Servant of her own, and the ritual was not wholly in vain. Rin decided she would meet him or her when Saber had left. She could not show her hand so soon, even to an innocent novice.  
“Tea would be nice.” Saber spoke up. Rin had forgotten how comforting the woman’s voice was. A ruler’s voice, decisive yet compassionate.  
Yonah coughed. Rin listened, watching the kettle as she heard the little girl choke back the first few breaths. It wasn’t out of politeness but dread. It crescendoed into a fit that rasped painfully at the little girl’s lungs and drowned out Nier’s words as he tried to comfort her. By the time Yonah stopped, the tea was done.  
“Has she been sick a long time?” Rin asked as she filled four cups. Yonah’s face was flushed with exertion.  
“Yeah. Dad said there was a lab here. I was hoping if we find them, that they might have a cure.”  
Rin looked out the glass door to the balcony. It was an urban wasteland, worst in the direction of Jericho where it had been almost flattened by battle, firebombing, and finally a nuclear blast. Rin suspected if there was a lab, they would have little concern for curing any sickness other than WCS.  
“There’s a lot to explain about the Grail War, but the most important is that if you win, the Grail can grant a wish.” Rin said, thinking of her own sister and what Sakura might have wished for from the Grail, or what Rin would have wished for Sakura, “The Grail could cure Yonah.”  
“It could!?” Nier’s eyes widened.  
“Or anything else you would wish for. What would you want, Yonah?”  
“Can I have a cookie?”  
“Take some.”  
It was a childish wish. Rin thought. A cookie. To be a hero, Rin thought. To destroy mankind. She rubbed the command seals on the back of her hand nervously, wondering if using the power of the Grail to save one’s sister was also childish and if she was wrong for suggesting it. The Grail War would start soon and last a few days, she told herself. Nier could change his wish. If nothing else, she hoped the dream of it would be enough to keep himself alive.  
Over an hour passed while Rin and Saber explained the Grail War. When she could tell no more, she bade Nier and his sister leave. Yonah tucked the cookie tin under her arm tightly.  
"Wait, Saber." Rin called out as the Servant was beginning to disappear from view down the stairs. Saber paused and turned back to face Rin. Rin stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Saber, holding the woman as close as she could with cold armor in the way "Keep him safe. Promise me." Rin whispered in Saber's ear. Saber grew tense.  
"On my honor." Saber nodded.  
“Good. Let me see you first if we must be allies, and last if we must be enemies.”  
Rin watched the three disappear through the ruins of the city. They would find somewhere safe, she was sure. Tomorrow, no, today, at dawn, the Grail War would begin. Rin entered her apartment again, this time making sure that the door was closed tightly and locked. She sagged against it when she was finished and rubbed the back of her hand.  
“You’ve been listening all this time, haven’t you?” Rin asked aloud.  
“Indeed.”  
There was a shimmer in the air in front of Rin as if it was boiling, and a man appeared in front of her. He was dressed in red, his skin so deeply tanned it made his white hair seem even brighter. Rin knew him well and rushed up to hug him in spite of herself.  
“Shirou…” She whispered into his chest.  
“Archer.” He corrected. “I am not your Shirou.”  
“You’re the Shirou I have.” Rin pouted, squeezing her Servant ever more tightly. “I never thought I would have the chance to see you again.”  
“’Again’? What happened?”  
Rin felt a physical pain squeezing her heart and spread into cold lumps that closed off her throat and filled her stomach with a feeling of illness. Archer didn’t remember the last war. Neither did Saber. Rin had blinded herself to the lack of recognition in Saber’s eyes and what should have been the obvious discomfort she had with Rin’s apparent familiarity.  
“It’s too much to go over now.” Rin said dismissively, wishing she could push off her feelings of disappointment just as easily. “I’m exhausted. We’ll head for Jericho tomorrow. Well, before noon today.”  
Rin yawned, watching Archer disappear into a shimmer of mana in the air through squinted eyes. It was well after midnight. Once more she threaded through the mess on her apartment floor, and rolled into bed without even bothering to take off her normal clothes. As she waited for sleep to claim her, Rin wondered if Archer would see or know or even care that tears were streaming quietly from her eyes. If this was the start of her war-- a string of errors and alone in her memories of the past—she despaired that she would win as surely as she had hoped.  
The touch of a warm, strong hand on her shoulder jolted Rin out of her sorrow.  
“You say you have summoned me twice. That’s not coincidence.” Archer whispered, “That bond may be the edge we need.”  
Rin smiled and squeezed Archer’s hand. He wasn’t the arrogant Servant she had summoned long ago, nor was she a foolish little girl. He wasn’t “her” Shirou, but neither was the real one.

Archer was with her now. That was all Rin needed.


	2. Emil I

With his palms pressed against his eyes, he could see her face.  He struggled to remember more of her smile and her wide eyes, but like grasping for a dream, the more he struggled, the fainter his memory became.  Finally there was a girl’s smile that had faded into darkness.  He had forgotten even her name.

 

Emil took his hands away from his face and rested them at his side, letting daylight warm his closed eyelids.  The world was warm and peach-colored now, with shadows where a dark manor rose up on one side.  The center of a now-dry fountain darkened another.  He could feel the cold stone of the fountain walls underneath his hands.

He dared not open his eyes.

If he did, he would see nothing but grey.

Emil buried his head in hands once more.  His elbows dug into the bare skin of his legs below the thin, cheap material of his shorts.  They still smelled of antiseptic, though Emil had forgotten why.  He was glad to be forgetting why.  He remembered stale air and dark corridors.  He remembered being angry about something, and yet infinitely more sad than angry.  He remembered the sound of gunfire and screams and knowing that there was someone at his side that hadn’t been there before, someone summoned in his hour of need.  Caster.  It was like he had crawled out of hell with Caster protecting him from all the demons that strove to keep him there.  Whoever Caster had not killed first, Emil had turned to stone while they were still alive.  That memory, Emil knew he would not lose.  Something had changed his eyes so that everything he looked upon would be turned to stone.

 

_Master, there is someone approaching.  Another master._

“A friend or an enemy?”  Emil asked.

_All other masters are enemies._

“Do they have to be, Caster?  I remember a lady--“

Emil felt the mana shift around him, and lithe arms wrap around his shoulder.  Caster no longer felt so omnipresent, but instead concrete and defined.  Emil felt calloused fingertips against the skin below his short sleeves, rough yet comforting.

“’Ladies’ are certainly not necessarily friends.”

“You don’t like them?”

“I liked one.”  Caster sighed.

Emil basked in the sound of his Servant’s voice, fluid and melodious.  Every word he spoke seemed like song, lilting and sweet. 

“Can I call you something else, other than ‘Caster’?  I want to be friends.”

“That is dangerous, Master.”

“My name is Emil.”

“Master Emil.  If someone can guess my identity beyond my appearance, if they know who I am, we will be at a disadvantage.”

“But I can’t even see you.”

“You think your eyes will turn me to stone as well?  Medusa herself could not.  Not for myself as a Servant at least.”

“But if I look at you, I will see everything else around you.  I wish I knew how you looked, if we’re going to be together for this ‘War’ thing.”

“Then take a guess.  Feel with your hands.”

Caster took Emil’s hand in his.  He guided the boy’s fingers to feel a smooth, polished wood and trace curved holes carved in its surface and strings strung across a gap between two wooden horns above the body.  When Emil touched the strings, he could hear them resound in descending intervals even without the intention of making music.

“This is my lyre.  Half the weapons I wield in battle.”  Caster explained.  Grasping Emil’s hands once more, he guided them upward to feel crisp folds of linen over a muscular chest and further up until Emil could feel soft skin beneath his fingers.  Emil felt out the contours of a strong chin, hesitating around an aquiline nose before he reached further upward.  Dense curls grasped at Emil’s fingers.  Nestled among Caster’s soft hair Emil felt a multitude of sharp edges.  He traced one point between his finger and thumb, a long, ovoid shape that ended at a rounded metal wire that sprouted another, similarly sharp shape on the other side.  One of his hands still held Caster’s cheek.  Emil could feel his face draw into a smile.

“That is my laurel wreath.”  Caster said.

“You’re...”  Emil murmured.  He had no words to finish his sentence.  His eyes were closed.  All he saw was the shadow of a man in front of a bright sky.  He tried to imagine the what the face he felt would look like.  A young man, something between boyish and handsome, though he could be could just as easily be the opposite.

_They’re close, Master Emil._

Suddenly there was no one beneath his fingertips.  Emil could hear footsteps approaching, by the sound of them, one solitary figure.

“But, who are you?  I won’t tell.”

_I trust you, Master, but I will tell you later._

“You promise?”  Emil asked.

_Of course, Master Emil.  Guard yourself, he comes._

The shade of the water fountain felt yet colder without Caster’s physical presence.  Emil waited, listening to the footsteps as they drew closer.  They crunched and thudded and jangled as leather ground into gavel, leather slapped against leather, and metal rattled against metal.  Emil did not dare open his eyes.  Enemy or not, he didn’t care.  He wouldn’t turn them to stone without making sure.  The footsteps stopped, not close enough to shade Emil’s eyelids against the sun.

“Hey there!  Yo!”  He heard a young voice call out.  The voice was a little raspy but high and boyish, confident but wary.  The person asked questions in different, strangely-accented languages until finally arriving on something Emil understood in Japanese.  “Is that your house?”

The grammar was bad, Emil knew, but no worse than his own.  Japanese was not his mother tongue, but neither was anything else that the stranger had tried.

“I don’t think so.” 

“Legion’ll get you with your eyes closed like that.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You’re in this ‘War’, aren’t you?  You got one of those Servant people too?”

 “How do you know?”

 “Those marks on your hand.”

 

_Caster, where is his Servant?_ Emil thought.

_I cannot say._   Caster answered uneasily.   _He is hidden from me._

“My servant tells me masters should make sure other masters are as dead as their servants.”  Emil announced.

“Assassin said so too.”

More crunching of heavy boots against gravel, and then the leaden sound of the boy coming to rest at Emil’s side on the fountain walls.  He smelled like seaspray and smoke.  Emil couldn’t remember having experienced either, but it reminded him of an oceanside bonfire.  The boy had a nice voice.  He had a smell that made Emil want to hold him close, even with the slight sweetness of gunpowder and the harshness of fuel that he could smell underneath the salt and ash.  Emil wished he could open his eyes and see if face and body matched words and voice.

“What do they call you, kid?”  the boy asked.

The thought of a number flitted across Emil’s mind’s eye but vanished just as quickly.  He answered, “Emil.  What about you?”

“They call me lots of things.  Depends on the unit I’m in.  ‘Smartass’, ‘Wiseguy’, ‘Encyclopedia Brown’-- but last guy at base called us by what colors we wore.  Some foreigner.  So I’m ‘Weiss’ for now, I guess.  Until I am put in another unit.”

“And you’re not going to fight me, Weiss?”  Emil asked.

“There’s no such thing as wishes.”  Weiss said hotly, “If there was, why hasn’t anyone wished for an end to this terror?  No, if there even is a Grail, it won’t help anyone.  There’s just us and Legion, and I’ve told Assassin twenty times already that anyone who can fight is too valuable to waste in some stupid war.” 

 

Emil thought on what the boy said, wondering how much trust he would put in him, and how much the boy had faith in his own words.  If he had a Servant as well to tell him about the Grail War, then it was self-evident that such a thing as a Grail would exist.  It only seemed obvious that the Grail’s powers were as truthful as the Servants summoned to help manifest it, and that if anyone was wrong, it was Weiss.  ‘Smartass’ indeed.

 

“Let’s make a deal.  We’ll work together until the end.”  Emil said.

“And at the end…?”  Weiss asked.

“We’ll find out, won’t we?”

“You’re naïve, kid.  I could betray you.  I could kill you.  Assassin could kill you.”

“Then use your command seals.”  Emil dared.

_Master, you don’t know what you’re doing…_

“Use a command seal to make Assassin never even try to kill me, and I’ll make Caster swear the same for you.  I’ll make Caster swear to protect you as he does me, and you do the same for Assassin.”

“That leaves one command seal left for each of us.”

“Right.  One spare.”

_Master, please!_

“One for the end, if we get even that far.  I’ll do it, Emil.  Swear to it?”

“Just swear?”

“We can make it a blood oath.  That’s what we did in one of my old units.  Our blood was our bond.”

“How does that work?”

“We cut the palms of our right hands, then shake.  If you don’t have a knife, you can use mine.”

Emil paused.  He placed his left hand over his eyes, fingers splayed to keep both lids closed.  He stuck out his right hand in front of him.

“I don’t know if I’ll blink.  You do it for me.”

_Master Emil, don’t be foolish.  You don’t know that boy._ Caster complained in Emil’s head.

_You don’t know him either_.  Emil thought back.  Weiss was a fellow Master, yet Weiss valued human life more than a wish on the Grail.  That was enough.

“Whatever you say.”

Weiss stood up with a rattle.  The scratch of Velcro ripping apart and the dull scrape of metal against hard plastic told Emil that Weiss was unsheathing a knife from somewhere on his person.  A cool, leather-gloved hand took his and Emil felt the blade of the knife as thin and light as the edge of a feather against his palm. 

“Ready?”

_Back out of it, please.  There are better ways to fight the Grail War._

Emil nodded.  He felt Weiss’ knife cut into his palm before he felt any pain or had any inkling that the boy would act so fast.  The wound stung with every unintentional flex of his hand.  Weiss let go and removed one glove with a pop.  A moment later he held Emil again in a handshake.  Weiss’ hand was as wet with sweat as it was with blood.

“We’ll say it together.  Tell our Servants to protect the other and not hurt them.  Then we’ll swear to do the same ourselves.” 

“Assassin, I command you to protect Emil like you protect me.” “Caster, I command you to protect Weiss like you protect me.”

The back of Emil’s hand felt like it was being branded with dry ice.  Caster was trying to resist the order.  By the way Weiss’ grip tightened, Emil guessed that the using of a command seal affected him the same way.

“Caster, I command you to never harm Weiss.” “Assassin, I command you to never harm Emil.”

“I, Weiss, swear to protect my blood brother Emil.”  “I, Emil, swear to protect my blood brother Weiss.”

Another searing pain as the second command seal burned up, and the deal was done.

 

“I got some bandages in my kit for your hand.  Say, how about I put them around your eyes, too?  Then you don’t need to worry so much.  You can have your hands free for whatever, even getting rid of your bandages if you need to use your eyes.”

 

Emil nodded, then waited and listened.  Weiss fumbled around himself without the use of his right hand, he could tell.  The jangling of his equipment came in fits, and at one point Weiss cursed in this mother tongue after something fell to the ground with a heavy thud.  A zipper moaned haltingly, then came the sound of rummaging papers.  Emil strained to hear the whisper of cloth unwinding from its coil and wrapping around Weiss’ injured hand.  Emil smiled slightly with pride.  He was learning how to adapt without eyes already, he thought, though it would still take time before he could understand his senses without so much given context.

 

Weiss moved with smooth rapidity once he finished binding his own hand.  In the time that it had taken to wrap his own right hand, the boy had covered both Emil’s injury and his eyes.  The cloth squeezed against both reassuringly.  Emil dared open his eyes to see a world of white linen turn to dark stone-grey.

 

“It worked!”  Emil smiled, wishing he knew where Weiss stood so he could hug him close in thanks.

“’Course it did.  Let me pack up again and let’s go.”

 

“It’s a weird question, but what are Legion?” Emil asked when Weiss finished putting away his gear.

“You never met them!?  How old are you?”

“Ten.”

“New recruit or something? I’m twelve.  I’ve been fighting them two years, since joining Hamelin.  Maybe you’re lucky you don’t know them.”  Weiss said, his voice cracking momentarily, “They’re all white-- like people who turn to salt with WCS-- but they still live.  They’re stupid berserkers, but some say they’re led by a worse one named Red Eye.  Guess why that is.  Anyway, they’re tough but still bleed.  We burn them when we’re done.”  Weiss tapped something of hollow metal near him, “So I have this flame thrower to do it.  The Luciferase we get might prevent WCS for us, but fire is the only thing that makes sure the particles that cause it don’t spread.”

“Is it hard, killing Legion?”

“They fight like bastards.  But they still are, were, human.  A little.  That’s the hardest. Anyway, let’s go.  I need to refill my canister and my magazines.  Just hold onto me and you’ll follow fine.  Not so many Legion on the outskirts here.”

Weiss grabbed Emil’s wrist and placed his hand on a cold metal canister.  Emil pieced together that it was strapped to the boy’s back.  Something liquid sloshed around inside with every step Weiss took.

 

_Emil._  Caster said, coalescing his mana just enough so that Emil could feel his lips brush against the ear Caster whispered into.  Emil immediately noted that he was not ‘Master’ now.   _Emil, more than your servant, I feel it is my duty as a man to a boy to teach you properly.  Even if you are young.  Why do you put your life in the hands of this child?_

Emil squeezed the cold metal of the fuel canister on Weiss’ back.   _Weiss tells me his name.  He gave up more than you could to be my blood brother.  I’m not mad at you Caster, but…_

_No apologies.  He is my charge as much as you are now, at your demand._

Phantom lips kissed Emil’s cheek.  Emil startled, a chill coursing down his spine.   _I will not fail you, Master Emil.  For you, I will go to hell and back._

_And you still won’t tell me your real name?_

_That boy hasn’t._

_He’s not my Servant._ Emil thought icily.

_I promise you, I will tell you in time._

_And Assassin?  Have you seen him?  What does he look like?_

_Not yet, though neither did I reveal myself to that child during your bargain._

They walked for a while before Weiss stopped with a scuff of his heavy boots against asphalt and a jangle of equipment. 

“Do you hear that?” he asked.

Emil strained his ears.  He could hear the breezes whistling through empty windows and the constant hum of insects underneath infrequent birdsong.  Tree leaves rasped against each other like waves breaking on a sandy beach.  Barely audible in the distance was something else that faded in and out of hearing with the changing direction of the wind.

“It sounds like… singing?”  Weiss said, followed by the sound of folding cloth and stretching leather straps.  The sound of the boy lifting his arm to point, Emil told himself “Over there.”

_A woman singing_ , Emil thought, though through some trick of the wind the voice changed between one person and many different ones,  _La la la la la.  La la la la la._


	3. Nier I

Yonah’s breaths came so raggedly that Nier feared his sister might soon cough up blood. As it always did, his heart still pounded long after her coughing fit ended. Saber knelt at Yonah’s side, rubbing her back. Nier’s throat tightened. Yonah was his sister. He needed to be the one to comfort Yonah, not Saber. All the same, he felt a weight off his chest that for once he did not need to scramble to Yonah’s side when her coughing fit woke him up this morning. It was a relief he hadn’t felt since they lost their parents—to not be alone with his little sister in the world.  
“Do you have a strategy?” Saber asked as soon as Yonah calmed enough for her smile to return.  
“Strategy? We just defeat the other Masters, don’t we?”  
Saber shook her head, narrowing her eyes while her jaw dropped in disbelief. “Of course not! You’re neither a warrior nor a commander!”  
“You’re right!” Nier shot back, “I’m not! I’m just your Master so if you have a better idea than picking them off one at a time, tell it to me!”  
“You must know your enemies first.” Saber said, so calmly that Nier could not help but let his boiling frustration simmer and subside. “Who are they?”  
“That woman, Rin. And the other Masters and Servants.”  
“Who are…?”  
“I forgot already, okay? It was a lot to take on at once.”  
“Other than myself, there are six servants: Archer, Lancer, Rider, Assassin, Berserker, and Caster. We don’t know them, their masters—aside from Rin—or their relative strengths. Say we defeat a weak one too early. We may lose a later chance to defeat a stronger foe for want of someone else to whittle him down.”  
“I guess that makes sense.”  
“I would recommend you find somewhere safe for Yonah as well. She is, if I may be frank, a liability on the battlefield.”  
“No. Not happening.” Nier shook his head vigorously, “I’m not leaving Yonah. There’s nowhere safe here. There’s nowhere she’d be able to get food on her own, and what if she gets sicker?”  
“Then stay close by her side. It will be easier to protect you both that way.”  
Nier frowned. He might not be a mage like Rin, nor a real fighter like Saber, but he’d been able to beat off Legion for years on his own. He’d done it even without real weapons, with whatever blunt or sharp object was at hand. It turned out that a half-brick or a pipe was just as effective as a gun or a knife looted from some dead Hamelin kid when it came to killing them. Better yet, bricks and pipes were plentiful and he never needed to worry about running out of bullets. Nier liked the pipe best for the distance it put between himself and the enemy.  
Standing up, Nier stretched out his arms and legs. He went over to Yonah and adjusted the hood on her jacket.  
“Let’s go. You have your cookies, right Yonah?”  
“Uh huh.”  
“Where are you going to?” Saber asked.  
“I don’t know yet, but—wait, do you hear that?”  
“Singing.” Saber said after a moment of listening with her eyes closed.  
“Let’s see if we can sneak up on them.”  
“Can you even sneak?”  
“Well enough!” Nier snorted.  
It was not long before they came upon the singer wandering through the streets towards the edge of Jericho. The buildings here were more intact than towards the center, still stretching dozens of stories up towards the sky. Nier hid behind a broken column that once pretended to be marble but had long ago crumbled to reveal spalling concrete and rusting steel. Nier tucked Yonah behind his back and leaned out from his hiding place just enough to watch the woman. Saber did the same. The woman made no indication of knowing that she was not alone as she sang something tuneless and walked along the cracks and broken paint that marked the middle of the road.   
Nier had never seen anyone like her. The woman’s skin was almost as pale as her white hair, which was pulled back from her face with a black ribbon so tattered it looked more like a wilted black flower. It was the only hint of fabric on her, but that was not to say the woman was not clothed. She wore a shifting dress made from ribbons of black smoke. Red motes of light pulsed like fireflies around each ribbon, and words crawled along them. Though they were in an alphabet Nier could not understand, the words still terrified him. They had a life of their own, and even if he could not read what the letters spelled out, their meaning was plain. They were as ugly as she was strangely beautiful.  
“Is she a mage or a Servant?” Nier whispered to Saber. At this distance, it was impossible to tell if she had command seals. Rin had worn normal clothes. Nier assumed that Saber’s clothes were of the same supernatural material as her body, but his Servant was far less ostentatious.  
“Mage, undoubtedly. But whether or not she is a Master… it wavers.”  
“Could you wear magic like that?”  
Saber’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Mana. Servants use mana. But you are a little right- her own body is barely able to contain the power flowing out of her.”  
“Just ’power’? Not mana?”  
“It’s not any mana from this world. Nier, let her go. A mage that powerful must have a dangerous servant.”  
“You don’t need to tell me twice. Yonah, let’s go back. We’ll—”  
Words caught in his throat as he saw Yonah’s face contort in panic as her breath hitched. The coughing fit was inevitable. Nier threw himself to his knees and held Yonah close. She coughed into the thick layers of his jacket. Even muffled, the noise was enough to grab the woman’s attention. She turned, her impossible dress floating around her as gracefully as ribbons of silk through water. The woman smiled. Her red eyes did not. Her face reminded Nier of his mother when she struggled to calm Yonah on some nights. Her mouth would say in a quavering voice, “I’m fine. Good night, Nier. I love you.” Her tone barely concealed sobs of frustration, despair, and rage.  
“Are you afraid of me?” the woman asked. Her question echoed against the steel, glass, concrete and asphalt ruins around her. Its sound reached Nier like a singer’s voice in a theater, resonant and reinforced by a hundred reverberating whispers that were all her own.  
Stepping out cautiously from behind the pillar, Nier shook his head. He could not be afraid, even if she was suspicious. If anything, he pitied the woman, to be so alone. Rin had someone to go back to, wherever she came from. If not that, she had a sense of propriety that dreamed she did. Otherwise she would have no need to dress so fashionably in red and black clothes of wool, and not of ugly words.  
“Is that your little sister? Her sickness must hurt her terribly. It must hurt you as well.” The woman said as she stepped forward on delicate pale feet, “I hate pain. All the world’s pain. My wish will be to end it.”  
Yonah seized her brother’s hand tightly. Nier felt frozen in place. The woman was certainly strange and likely powerful, but none of that nor the ugliness of her magic yet meant that she was a bad person. She could talk, so she couldn’t be Legion either. She might be alone, a victim.   
“And you have Saber with you. You remember me, don’t you Saber? You know what I wish and what he did are the same. A noble dream worthy of the Grail.”  
“Don’t come one step closer.” Saber warned, swiftly interposing herself between Nier and the woman, “I don’t know what you are talking about.”

The woman continued forward, stopping just as a tiny indentation appeared in the middle of her chest. Saber stiffened for an instant. The woman knew exactly how long Saber’s invisible sword was. Nier tried to avert his eyes. What she wore failed to cover much and scarcely obscured the same skin from one moment to the next. So close, he could see that she was covered in faded scars. Both arms seemed to be tattooed with intricately patterned red gloves that were nearly solid at the finger tips and grew more open until the color ended close to her elbows. If they were command seals, she either had one or one thousand demands for her servant.

“What is her name, your sister?”  
“Yonah. I’m Nier.”  
“Do you think you are a good big brother to Yonah? Or will you only hurt her when you fight and fail to reach the Grail?”  
Nier balked at the sudden turn in conversation. He couldn’t find any words to respond with before the woman continued, her voice cracking like she was about to sob, though her red eyes remained bright and dry.  
“You’ll abandon her if you fight for the grail.” She accused, “She will hurt or she will die. If she’s with me, the Grail will ease her pain. She will be the first of the world to be saved and reborn with its power.”  
Before Nier could blink, before Saber could move, the woman had darted behind them. She ripped Yonah from Nier with so much force he almost fell to the pavement. Yonah’s cookie tin clattered to the ground, spilling its contents. Nier spun around. The woman held Yonah under one arm as easily as if she was a bundle of pillows and not a panicking child. Saber’s sword had drawn blood. An even, shallow cut over her right breast wept a dark, human blood-red.  
“Yonah! Give her back!” Nier roared. Any hold sympathy had on him shattered. He rushed up to the woman, holding his pipe in a white-knuckled grip. He would cave her head in for as much thinking about hurting Yonah. Now that the freakish bitch had gone as far as stealing her, Nier was certain he wouldn’t stop until the woman was beyond dead.  
“Don’t worry about Yonah.” The woman said, once more calm, waiting for Nier to close the gap between them. In her arm, Yonah kicked, scratched, and bit like a wildcat. The woman paid no attention even as her skin broke into bright red streaks and lunettes of blood. “Lancer, take care of his Servant. My minions will do the rest.”  
Nier’s first blow struck nothing but empty air as the woman dodged. The second rang out against asphalt. At the last second, the woman leapt away so powerfully she seemed to fly and landed on the sill of a blasted-out window two floors up. Saber, her invisible sword still drawn, jumped up to carve her in two from below. Instead of finding her mark, she was struck back with redoubled force into the crumbling buildings across the road. Nier staggered, nearly dropping his pipe to the ground in shock. Where there was once empty space stood a literal giant of a man holding a spear the size of a tree. The giant brought his spear back to readiness, ignoring Nier as he focused on the hole blasted into the building opposite him, waiting for Saber to emerge. The giant was ugly, and his appearance little improved by a crown of seven thick, interlocking, iron bands. He had a miser’s face, haggard and sallow and hateful.   
A plume of dust slowly out of the hole. He counted his heartbeats as he begged in his heart for Saber to have survived the attack. He edged away from Lancer, eyeing the dark, empty maw that used to be the foyer of some office. Lancer paid no attention.   
Slowly, a rumble joined the sound of his heart. With the rumble came a hundred pairs of dull red eyes lighting the darkness inside the abandoned buildings. There was no hope to go in after Saber now. Legion poured out of the office building like an avalanche, blinding white in the sun. Nier spun around, hoping to find a way to funnel the berserkers down until he could fight only a few at a time. Instead he found himself surrounded. Legion had appeared from behind the giant as well, mindlessly crawling over his feet to get closer to Nier. The strange woman was nowhere to seen and Yonah had disappeared with her.  
“That’s impossible! Saber!” Nier cried out, laying into the closest monster. His pipe made a sickening crack against the skull that did no more than cause the creature to look up at the offending weapon with eyes that had once been human. Nier struck out twice more and the creature fell motionless to the ground. It was impossible, he thought as he bludgeoned his way through the sea of Legion. They would never wait to kill a man, much less gather for the chance to do so as a single horde. They were mindless predators, and if Nier had ever found more than two together it could only have been due to extraordinary bad luck.  
Unless they had a command.  
Nier counted, this time not his heartbeats but the number of Legion he felled. Before he had reached five, he saw Saber emerge from the ruins like a blue streak. His eyes met hers for a moment and Nier caught Saber’s attention switching quickly between her Master and Lancer. Lancer stepped back to ground himself and his spear against Saber, crushing a half dozen Legion beneath his foot. Nier stove in the head of a sixth monster. Saber feinted, avoiding Lancer and his spear all together so she could spring from the building behind him towards Nier. With a single strike of her sword, another half dozen Legion were cut in half. They sprayed their living comrades red with blood as each piece fell to the ground.  
“Which way do we run?” Nier asked as Saber positioned her back to his. Legion continued to scramble over the corpses of their own dead.  
“There’s too many.” Saber growled, “And I cannot fight Lancer and these demons at the same time.”  
A shadow passed between the buildings on either side of them. Nier broke his attention away from Legion only long enough to make sure it was not Lancer coming to crush Nier and Saber both. Lancer had only just begun to approach. This time he allowed Legion to flee from each step before it landed.  
“Your bearing betrays you, fellow king.” Lancer said. His voice was so loud and deep Nier could feel it vibrate in his chest, “Legion cares only for living men. It is unsporting to destroy brainless commoners who have no desire to fight you.”  
Saber did not miss a beat in responding as she continued cutting down Legion. “Tell that to your Master who sends a hundred to kill one man instead of doing it herself.”  
Lancer laughed. “That is war. A fool ignores his strengths for the sake of mere propriety.”  
A shadow fell over the road again. This time it did not disappear. Instead it grew only darker. A hot wind blew in gusts that grew so strong they tore the hood of Nier’s jacket from his head. He heard a woman’s voice whoop and shout, too far and too joyous to be Saber’s.  
“Woo! I am LOVING this shit!”  
Suddenly the air grew hot. Nier didn’t dare tear his attention from the Legion surrounding him. They certainly paid no attention to the sudden change in weather. Not even when Nier finally saw the blast of flame land in front of him and roast Legion alive did any of the monsters as much as blink.   
“Did you see what did that!?” Nier shouted over the roar of burning bodies.  
“A dragon!” Saber shouted back, but she hardly needed to answer. The creature swooped low overhead, its red wings barely kissing the tops of the flames it had spat. It eyed Nier warily. A young woman wearing light blue straddled the dragon, holding its neck closely. A brown-haired man jumped off of the dragon’s back, landing neatly on the pavement below.

The man unsheathed his sword. He gestured with eyes and a lift of his chin. The woman behind Nier should go to the giant. The man smiled. He was happy to help kill Legion. Only too happy. Above, the woman left riding the dragon cheered as the red dragon unleashed another gout of fiery breath on legion behind him. He could tell by the heat searing his back.  
“Saber, I think he’ll help me. You take care of Lancer.”  
“If you trust him.”  
“Do it!” Nier shouted. Already the man had mown down swathes of monsters as if they were wheat. There were not many other options, and none better than trusting this man and his dragon. More quickly than Nier had expected, the impenetrable tide of enemies dwindled. Nier could find time to catch his breath wand watch Saber fight Lancer. It was more even now that Saber had a read on her opponent. The red dragon fought as well, harrying the giant from the sky and scorching him with flame.

“Now who complains about ‘fairness’?” Lancer chided, “Nevertheless, I’ve served my purpose. We will meet again, little king, and no dragon will help you.”

As quickly as he had appeared, Lancer vanished. He had been as large as a building. Now the road seemed much broader and the air freer with him gone. Nier rushed to Saber’s side. She had the worse of the two fights. The red dragon’s errant fire had singed her, and glancing blows from Lancer left her heavily bruised.   
“You’re alright?” Nier panted.  
“Fine enough, with this unexpected assistance.”  
“We need to-“

He needed to save Yonah from that woman, but the red dragon and its rider landed before he could finish his sentence. A girl jumped down from the dragon’s back, giving it an appreciative pat on the shoulder. The dragon’s eyes bore into Nier’s derisively. Nier turned instead to the girl. She was around his own age and dressed in a way that left only a little less to the imagination than the strange pale woman’s dress. At least the thin, silky, sky-blue fabric attempting to cover her up did so like normal fabric should- without its own light, words, or movement. 

“Um, thanks. You didn’t need to help us…”  
“Kainé. And no, but Red told me Rider’s a ‘quantity over quality’ guy for fighting, when he gets a choice.” Kainé shrugged.  
“But you helped with Lancer.”  
“I don’t like bullies.” Kainé said curtly. “Where’s his master?”  
“She took my sister and ran off.”  
Kainé’s mouth twitched in anger. “So you’re gonna get that bitch, huh?”  
“I’m going to get Yonah back. After that what happens, happens. But she seems like she’s working with Legion…”

At the thought, the adrenaline that carried him through battle once again set Nier’s heart racing. There were so many, and Saber alone was barely able to hold her own against Lancer. He would die if he would have to fight so many Legion on his own again. Yonah would be alone and helpless without him.

“You’re good in a fight, wanna wipe them out with us?”  
“As long as it gets me to Yonah.”  
“Yeah, bet it will. Yonah and the Grail. Say, it’s been a while since I’ve had someone human to talk to.”

Nier smiled slightly, surprised that a girl like that, his own age even, would be glad for his company. If Saber could get along with Rider, Nier could be certain that the strange woman and her servant would fall.


	4. Illya I

He was a National Research Weapons Laboratory project. Even if Illya hadn’t seen the child in person at the lab, she would have known it on sight. Mana flowed around the child in a constant swirl, consumed by his eyes as they continually tried to turn the world to stone yet reborn as quickly by the maso particles forced into his young body. He was a crude product of science and blood magic, though less crude than his sister. As a biological weapon, he was almost perfect.  
Some two hundred meters ahead of her, the boy she knew as Number Seven lay back on a grassy hillside in what had once been a city park. He still wore the clothes given to them in the lab, though now his eyes were bandaged over. His companion, another child weighed down with military gear, was carefully pouring fuel from one large canister into the smaller one he had taken off his back. Both were Masters, Illya noted with a sense of mixed relief and annoyance. Regardless of potential, neither boy would have had training as a mage. If all else was as expected, that left only two unknown Masters, also unlikely to be from one of the great mage families. Illya’s part in the Grail War would be that much easier, yet that much more difficult.  
A Weapons Lab project, Illya thought again. Short-sighted and cruel, yet more importantly stealing precious resources from the scientists under Einzbern thumbs. Illya giggled to herself. Her family’s lost magic was on the cusp of being fully reborn, not through the Grail, but through maso research in Project Gestalt. The first tentative steps had needed her family’s involvement. Ironically, its very rebirth through science meant it was no longer, nor could it ever be, “True” magic once more. If only the Weapons Lab could be persuaded to hand over more of the dead dragon, or at least their private store of Hamelin field data. Then Illya could hasten the death and rebirth of her family’s legacy.  
“What do you think, Berserker?” Illya asked her Servant.   
He blended into the hillside well, appearing like another set of ancient trees or boulders with his deeply tanned skin and rough clothes stretched across a giant, muscular build. Berserker said nothing and moved only a little to indicate he heard her question. Illya liked Berserker. She felt safe with him. Now he was solely focused on the potential for another fight, but when there was no prospect of battle he was a comfort. Even if Berserker did not remember the last Grail War, he was still the same as when she last summoned him. She had only grown a little since then, and he could still carry her like a small child.  
“We should pay them a visit before they leave. Focus on the blond one first, the other boy would make a far weaker magus no matter how much training he could receive.”  
As commanding as she sounded, Illya still had a tinge of worry. Number Seven had less than a day to get used to his powers and his Servant. He appeared to have spent most of it pointedly ignoring either, or else the other boy would be dead and he not blindfolded. But Illya still remembered the maelstrom that had struck the underground research lab. His sister had run amok and her power was frightening even to a seasoned mage like Illya. Illya had escaped the lab with only a glimpse of Number Seven, but if he had struck down his own sister that was all she needed to know.  
The Hamelin soldier’s head snapped up. He nearly dropped his fuel canister as he frantically searched around him. His Servant, whoever or wherever he was, had told him something. Number Seven startled at the sound of the other boy’s fumbling, a sound too distant for Illya to hear. The soldier looked directly at Illya, then slowly, deliberately, leaned in to whisper something to Number Seven. Number Seven touched the bandages over his eyes and nodded.  
Illya sighed. She had taken too long.  
If not a magus’ training, the Hamelin child at least had what passed for a soldier’s. It was a training primed to be wary of anything as white as salt and especially with red eyes. Almost like herself. Illya knew the real Red Eye and the thought of being compared to them made her skin crawl.   
“No sense drawing this out.” Illya muttered, suddenly remembering a phrase she had heard once. Speak not the Watchers. Draw not the Watchers. “We’ll see who did a better job at watching whom.”  
Hercules extended a hand down to Illya, who gracefully alighted for the brief journey up to his shoulder. The pair flew out of the forest and across gently rolling hills. Number Seven’s Servant manifested in front of the child. A young man with some sort of harp, Illya noted. He strummed the instrument and the air around him stirred until the Servant’s sandaled feet hovered above the grass.   
“Emil, it’s Red Eye!” the Hamelin child shouted. He drew a pistol from a holster at his waist and aimed it at Illya.   
Before he even pulled the trigger, Illya cast a barrier around herself and Berserker. With a series of deafening cracks, the child fired his weapon. Soft lead bloomed open like flower buds against her magic and fell harmlessly to the ground. Illya smirked. Normal bullets were nothing against magic. If he were a mage, he would know that.  
“Heh?” Berserker grunted. His eyes narrowed, locking in on Caster.  
“Oh, you do remember me, Hercules? And after such a short time with the Argonauts!”  
Illya frowned. With no weapon but a lyre, the Servant had to be Caster. He was an arrogant one to call out her own Servant’s true name. If she had less faith in Hercules’ strength, it might have put her off balance. Instead it seemed to Illya to be more of a desperate ploy, knowledge without the power to back it up.  
“I remember you, of course.” Caster continued, smiling devilishly, “Mother was always partial to her epic heroes. Say, let me compose a poem for you, right now.”  
Caster sang, his voice sweet and wine-dark. Blades of grass bent down towards him to listen while tree branches leaned in. When he sang of how Hercules murdered his own teacher, the rocks on the hillside grew red with anger. They smoldered, blackening the dirt around them when Caster told of how Hercules smashed his lyre on Linus’ head, killing him instantly. Caster’s song grew urgent and dissonant as he described the sorrow of Linus’ mother and brother. The stones, white-hot and vengeful, flung themselves towards Hercules. He batted them away with his club without a second thought and advanced on the other Servant unshaken. Caster could move stones to anger, but he could not make Hercules regret after death what he never mourned in life. Yet tears rolled down Illya’s cheeks, no matter how hard she steeled herself against Caster’s imaginative ballad.  
Berserker struck, but Caster could only manage to dodge. Illya wracked her brain. Who would know Berserker? He knew, but his type was bound to wordlessness. If she knew, she could help him better.   
Thud.  
A bolt pierced the center of Hercules’ massive forehead, buried in his skull until the fletching. Illya shrieked with dismay. Assassin. It had to be. Archer, she knew, would be someone else’s, if that Master would have Illya’s same luck with Servants. Berserker staggered backwards. Red-hot stones pelted him, burning Berserker’s bare skin and leaving his tunic smoking. He reached up to his forehead and found the short end of the bolt too small for his massive fingers to grasp. He reached back and wrapped his fist around the shaft of the bolt. He pulled it through with a bellow of anger. The bolt vanished into ether before it hit the ground. The gaping hole in Berserker’s forehead filled with new skin as if Hercules had never been wounded. With a roar he struck aside the next volley of stones. His next blow crushed into Caster’s lyre, breaking one string.  
Illya counted to herself, “One.” One of twelve labors, lost. She had underestimated the Hamelin child. If she lived, she would keep an eye on him. He could have more use for Hamelin than as a mere frontline soldier. Only inexperience kept him from using magecraft and not bullets against her, and that same inexperience still produced a Servant as strong as his. And Number Seven was yet stronger, though more inexperienced. He had started unwinding the bandages around his head. With every layer of fabric removed from his eyes, Illya could feel herself slowed down, though not turned to stone. By the time he could stare her in the face she felt like she was moving through water despite her barriers.  
Yet clear as day, Caster sang. This time he attacked not Hercules’ history, but his pride. The rocks around them cooled yet flew just as fast and sharp. Grass underfoot plucked at teased at the hero. The sandy soil laughed fluidly, falling down to the bottom of the hill with a dry haaaa-haaaa-haaaa. Berserker struggled to stand as the ground pulled at and gave way beneath him. His face grew red. For want of a young man, Caster sang, he missed a sogn so sweet that even the sirens were drowned out. At those lyrics, Illya finally knew. Odysseus blocked their sweet song with wax in his ears. Orpheus guided his ship past the half-bird, half-woman monsters with song.   
Hercules struck at Orpheus. The first hero’s face was purple with rage as his club swung overhead. The second’s turned white when that club struck not Orpheus himself, but the second of seven strings and much of the rest of the soundboard. That might be his Noble Phantasm, Illya thought to herself. Hercules won his immortality through his labors. Orpheus cheated death through song.   
They battled on. Illya staved off bullets with magic, slowed but not stopped by Number Seven’s frightened staring. When the soldier ran out of bullets, he pulled out another gun rather than reload the first. In her heart, Illya dared him to use the fuel cannister on his back. He would quickly learn how badly flame worked against a mage who was not Red Eye. Hercules struggled on against both Orpheus and his constantly shifting mockery and the real destruction it wrought, even more than the still invisible Assassin. Two more strings of Orpheus’ lyre snapped as Hercules lost the effort of another ten labors. Illya felt tears stream down her face. They burned hot, spurred to anger by Orpheus’ song, and darted away from her cheeks leaving only parched skin and salt. It didn’t matter to Illya, none of what Orpheus said. None of her Servant’s failings, nor his foolishness, nor anyone else he had loved. He alone cared for her, not once but twice.  
Hercules stumbled backward for the last time. Illya cried out in spite of herself. She ran forward to try and catch him, even as aware as she was that he could crush her with his weight and Hercules was too far away. He was going to dissolve soon. Illya could feel him being ripped away from her, like her heart was being torn in two. Hercules crashed to the ground just as Illya reached him. She picked up his head and cradled it in her lap, not knowing what to say even as he disappeared into a thin glimmer of lingering mana.  
Illya looked up. She stared down the barrel of the Hamelin child’s pistol. Sweat glistened on his forehead. He panted rapidly through a taught grimace. Assassin was still nowhere. Caster had disappeared, nursing his battle wounds no doubt.  
“Red. Eye.” He said. The words were heavy with a lifetime of loss and regret. A lifetime, Illya thought, though he had entered this life at ten and had hardly ventured into his teens. The leaders of Hamelin would have created a grand line of mages, had they command of magecraft.  
“I’m not Red Eye.” Illya said flatly. “But I know they are a trained mage, like myself. You know that bullet won’t pierce my barrier. Nor will the remaining six. You won’t be able to hurt them either, not without magecraft. With the pact they made, their Servant will destroy both of yours easily.”   
“You know Red Eye?” The boy lowered his sights. “If you’re not them or Legion, I’m not killing you.”  
“You’re serious? They fought in the last Grail War. As did I.”  
“So are ‘they’ a guy or a girl?” the boy asked.  
“She is one person and many. Her story is a tragedy. And you? If you and-” Illya thought better of calling the other child ‘Number Seven’ “- Caster’s master will fight alongside each other, that is one thing. But I might find another Servant and fight you again. I won’t lose twice.”  
“I don’t care. You’re not Red Eye. That’s enough.”  
Illya covered her mouth as she laughed. For a soldier with such an empty stare, he was so innocent. “What is your name?” she asked.  
“Weiss.”  
“Weiss. Like ‘White’, ‘Shiro’? Or ‘Wise’?”  
“I dunno, what do those mean?”  
Illya realized then that Weiss’ understanding of Japanese was only basic, and his English or German was abysmal. “They are only words.” She excused herself, “Yet words have power. And his name?”  
Number Seven answered her readily, “I’m Emil.”  
His eyes were closed as he spoke. Emil reached for the ends of the bandage that had been wound around his head and started the slow process of rebinding it. ‘Emil’. Illya thought. It sounded more like a real boy’s name than ‘Weiss’, yet who was more the real boy? Hamelin, and its shadow arm in the National Research Weapons Laboratory, had not been kind to either. Neither had the von Einzbern family legacy been especially kind to her. To endure, they had to find unnatural creations. A synthesis of girl and homunculus. A boy tempered into a weapon of physical brutality. Another infused with magic beyond even his creators’ comprehension.  
“Emil. Weiss. I can take you to Red Eye. I can help you defeat them. If you’ll have me.”  
“Sure. Assassin’s saying nothing.”  
“You Pandora.” Accused Caster, manifesting once more. He held Emil close, to the boy’s confusion.  
“I know a little myth. Orpheus.” Illya snorted. Caster blanched at the use of his name as she continued, “You’re cruel to call me names like that. But remember: Her vessel contained hope for all mankind as well.”  
“A hope you kept trapped in the last Grail War, no doubt.”  
“And were you there!?” Illya countered hotly, stamping one foot like she was a child and not almost forty years old. “At least I don’t look back! I look forward!”  
“Wench!”  
“Caster, be nice. She’s offering to help us.” Emil interrupted sweetly, desperately tugging at Caster’s arm.  
Caster relented only just. He looked down on Illya scornfully. “She lost. Of what use would she be to you?”  
“She lost against two people. It wasn’t fair.”  
“She’s not a proper participant in the Grail War, not without a Servant. And what if she somehow summons another and betrays us in the night?”  
“Then we do it again, you and me and Weiss and Assassin. Except then we know each other even better, and she won’t know her Servant near as well.”  
“Master, you are a foolish child.” Caster said, “I wish you would listen when I try to teach you. But if this is your wish, then very well.”  
Illya frowned. Number Seven was naïve, but not a fool. She had seen the boy clench and wring his hands, fighting the urge to use another command seal to force Caster to obey. Yet, he did not. Weiss had watched the whole exchange silently. There were a dozen moments when she would have been distracted enough for either he or Assassin to finish Illya off, and yet they did not. The boy was honest, whatever his reasons were.  
“You won’t regret this.” Illya promised, “Caster. Orpheus. There is one thing I want you to know about Red Eye. Something you alone can do. May I tell him, Emil?”  
Emil nodded.  
Illya whispered into Caster’s ear. For the first time, he smiled at her.


	5. Rin II

Rin stabbed into a piece of cold mackerel and shoved it into her mouth.  Her dream last night had sat badly all morning, and grew worse the more she teased apart the details.  It was not truly a dream, but Archer’s memories. She felt as though she was falling back in time through them.  Archer lounged across from her, his plate cleaned of every single grain of rice. He watched Rin. He watched her impatiently, she judged.  It was almost noon already. She stabbed a second piece of fish even harder. Her fork shrieked across the plate. Rin slammed both hands onto the table and stood up.  She paced back and forth as much as she could, which ended much like turning around in place with how crowded the room was with stacks of books.

“Is something wrong, Rin?” Archer asked.

“Why can't I be in your memories!?” Rin demanded, pointing an accusatory finger at Archer.

Archer stopped merely watching and began staring, nonplussed.

She wanted to shove the dream out of her mind, but she could not forget it.  She remembered a girl, barely a woman, with white hair and a black ribbon. The room was dark, illuminated by torchlight trickling through a barred window in the door. The girl’s eyes were red in that meager light. Red and full of bottomless rage and resignation.  Things writhed slowly on the dark floor like maggots. Even woken from the dream-memory, Rin could smell the fetid, abattoir stench of the dark cell. She wondered when it happened, whether it was something out of the past or the future.

If that was something Archer had been through, as Shirou or the Heroic Spirit Emiya, did she really want to have been there?  Rin wondered for only a moment. 

“Why can't I be in your memories?” Rin murmured. Her eyes were beginning to burn with tears. “What does she mean to you that I don't?”

“Rin.” Archer said, unmoved by her quavering voice, “My life is unbounded by time. Yours is not. How can I promise that of those infinite moments, you will see the precious few we ever shared?”

Precious. Rin thought, precious, yet he couldn't remember when they last met and insisted he was not the same Archer she knew. He was lying, she was certain.  He was coddling her. Rin ruminated on the thought and it grew more sour each time it returned to her mind. She squandered her chance during the last war. If she had dared to be more open, then....

Then what? Requited love did not mean it was reciprocated. Archer had, Shirou had, felt something for that other woman. It only meant that Rin was the real "other".

She would never be an “other”.  She had something that no one else cared to preserve.  That would prove it to him. 

“Look at this.”  Rin commanded. “I’ve had it since the last Grail War.”

“What was so important you’re clinging to it all these years?”  Archer asked.

With shaking hands, she pulled a thin wallet out of her coat pocket.  Rin clenched it tight and reminded herself that Archer was not Archer, and less was he Shirou.  With a shivering breath, she reached into a thin, heavily worn pocket of the wallet. She took out a laminated piece of paper and handed it to Archer, marveling briefly that she had the wisdom to do so at the time.  She wasn’t sure she could find a laminator anywhere in the broken, overcrowded remains of Fuyuki City nowadays.

Archer narrowed his eyes, asking, “What is this?  A black dot?”

“Yes, that dot.”  Rin said, “It was caught on a satellite camera, and disappeared within a few minutes.  This was from a newspaper article on it, ‘Mysterious Spot Over Jericho?’. At the time, there was enough need to edit out the people from the image.  That dot… that was the moment I lost Shirou. The Grail was- the Grail was in the process of being claimed. He was dying, until the red dragon told him there was another way out. Shirou could make a pact with Saber.  So he did. And he tried. And… that was the result. I never saw him again.”

“But you are certain he survived, because I am here.”  Archer guessed.

Rin nodded.

“Will that be enough of a wish to carry you to the Grail?”

“Yes.”  Rin said.  Yet doubt crept into Rin’s thoughts.  Shirou would be worthy of a wish. He was worthy enough of a wish to die for.  But there were other things as well. “I’m not a girl who would win for the sake of winning anymore.  And you? Would you still want nothing else but to kill Shirou if you met him?”

“That is what I last wanted?”  Archer said. He stood up and embraced Rin from behind.  It felt like lightning coursing down her spine. Archer’s large, cool hands rested on her hips and pressed Rin close to him.  He whispered in her ear, “I see some sense in it. Though you know that will not be possible. The Grail cannot grant both your wish and mine.”

“Shirou would find a way.” Rin huffed.  She leaned into Archer, resting her head against his broad, firm chest. “He always believed the impossible.  He would try again and again, every time he failed. And what is with your holding me like this?”

“I am not Shirou, but there is something of him still in me.  There is something about a woman who would use her one wish to bring back someone she knows would squander it on saving everyone.  It might be enough to keep a man going through the hypocrisy that is heroism in this world.”

“You’re the one saying that, not me!”  Rin protested, breaking free from Archer’s comforting hold on her.  “We’re wasting time. Save your mana, I’ll get my things and we’ll go.” 

Archer vanished.  Rin gathered her magic crystals and packed the food she thought would replenish her through the Grail War. Little was truly filling, but it would do.  As she made one last pass through her cabinets, she found a second tin of cookies to the back of an upper shelf. Rin pulled it forward, resting the tips of her fingers on its embossed lid as she remembered Yonah.  She would have to see the girl again, Rin thought. She would have to fight Nier as well. The whole tin was too bulky, but she packed a few cookies into her pockets. They would be a cold comfort when Rin took Nier’s chance at the Grail, but they would be something.

Rin looked back at the apartment one last time before she closed the door.  Sunlight poured through the balcony window, illuminating all the dust in the living room with golden light and catching the embossing on some of her more precious books scattered around the floor.  Even looking at it gave her a sudden urge to clean, but Rin held back. She needed her energy and her mana. When this was over, she promised herself, she would tidy everything up and move back to Fuyuki.  She would make her wish and then be a normal mage for the rest of her life. Another Grail War couldn’t come so soon three times in a row.

_ Are you hesitating? _   Archer asked inside Rin’s head.

_ Never!  But I won’t be seeing this place much more.   _ Rin sighed aloud.

She had only just turned around when she saw the dragon once more.  It reeled around the sky above Tokyo before diving between wrecked buildings.

“Archer!  It’s that dragon!  The one that fell! We need to go there.  Now!”

Archer materialized beside Rin.  “You know that dragon?”

“Red.  I saw her when she came to this world.  She was Rider’s in the last Grail War.”

“And who was Rider, that he alone of Heroic Spirits rides a dragon?”

Rin shook her head.  “He never spoke. Red said it was his pact price.  Different than the bond of Masters and Servants, they shared one life instead of Red drawing his mana.  You should remember that. Never mind, let’s get going.”

Archer scooped Rin up in his muscular arms and leapt from the balcony.  As she hadn’t in over two decades, Rin felt as close as she ever had to flying.  Wind tore at her ponytails, sharp and cold. Even with how easily Archer could hold her up, she felt  the weight of their fight against gravity. For a heartbeat, they were high above the city and weightless, and then began Archer’s fall to earth.  One jump took Rin and Archer over two rooftops. There were many more until they would reach Rider and Red and whoever they had decided to fight.

Red had the chance to swoop down once more before Archer and Rin landed on the closest building.  A smoke trailed up from the building’s facade. But for a moment, the fight seemed to have finished.

Rin peeked out over the edge of a ruined building.  The street below was filled with the bloodied white bodies of Legion.  Some were scorched black with dragonfire. In the middle of it all, Rin could make out the shapes of two men, one of them Rider, and a young woman she presumed was his Master.  Disbelief stopped her from recognizing Nier sooner. They were talking. That was good, Rin thought, Nier hadn’t had his idiot head stove in by someone more competent yet, and Rider’s Master was not wholly in a fighting mood.  Rin wondered why. It could have been that the amount of death had sated Rider’s appetite for now, but something seemed wrong with the scene.

Rin hissed through her teeth.  Just as Nier was so incongruous she had failed to realize his presence at first, so was an absence.  Yonah was nowhere to be seen.

“Archer!”  Rin demanded.

“You wish to join them?”

“Now.  Set me down beside both of them.  I need to give Nier a piece of my mind.”

Archer looked skyward pleadingly first, but obeyed.  Within less than a space of a breath, Rin was in his arms and soaring downwards before being let down on solid ground.  She smoothed her ponytails back behind her shoulders and practiced her scowl on a score of Legion corpses before turning it on Nier.

“Where is Yonah!?”  Rin demanded, “I thought you would protect her, but it looks like Saber had her hands making sure only you would be safe, you useless-!”

Nier gaped at her, equal parts shocked and embarrassed.  The woman he had been talking with seemed purely unsurprised.  Rin didn’t blame her. She didn’t look like a mage, but would have within the space of days come into ownership of Rider and his dragon, Red.  For a novice, anything would be believable after that.

“I’d have liked to see you protect your sister better!”  Nier shot back.

For a second Rin was taken aback, but she quickly surmised that Nier had said it only in the hypothetical.

“Yes.”  Rin said darkly, “If I could have done anything for my sister, I’d have died doing it.  Why didn’t you? You couldn’t fight a few Legion alone and needed Rider and his Master to help!?  You think you and them can do better than me and them?”

“Lancer was here.”  Nier whispered. “And the weird woman.”

“What ‘weird woman’?”  Rin asked.

“With the white hair and red eyes.”

“What else?”  Rin asked, seizing Nier by the shoulders, “What else?  White hair. Red eyes. And?”

“Words?”  Nier suggested desperately, shivering as he tried to not recall, “She didn’t have anything but words and a ribbon in her hair.”

Rin relaxed, letting go of Nier.  She clutched her forehead. Of all that could have happened after she failed to help Sakura, of all that she held close after seeing the photo of a black dot over Jericho… In a way, Rin felt grateful.  Illya had nothing to do with Nier for now. That changed the math.

“I know her.”  Sakura said firmly, “You, Master of Rider.  We should go and-”

Rin felt Archer materialize behind her.  It was a warning more to her than to anyone else.  She was overstepping her strength. She was a Master with a Servant, but only one against two pairs.

“I’m sorry, Nier.”

“Sorry?”

“I can’t expect you to know anything.  Or her. Neither of you know magecraft, right?”

Nier shook his head while the woman narrowed her eyes and parted her lips in a way that offered a single thought and three words, “What the fuck?”

“I know magecraft.  You both are dead weight to your Servants without it. I know Nier- who are you?”

“Kainé.”

“Kainé.  You’re lucky to have Rider with you, more than Nier is to have Saber.”

“And why would that be?”

“Well, look at you.”

Of all things, Rin did not expect a woman half her age dressed in a sky-blue negligee and heels to stomp her way up close enough to jab a finger at Rin’s breastbone.

“Like I’d expect some dumpy old woman to know shit!  Where the fuck’ve you been all this time? Not fucking around Tokyo, I bet, you don’t even have the fucking accent.  You think your magic is so goddamn special? I got me and my machetes with me for five fucking years against Hamelin and more against Legion.  Where the fuck was your magic then, you shitstain?”

“Fuyuki City.  Studying for the next Grail War, which you should have already learned is more serious than Legion.  Don’t mistake my absence for ignorance.”

Most of Rin was disgusted by Kainé.  Any attractiveness that might have been found in her severe face was undermined first by her body language and furthermore by her foul mouth.  Rin had squandered her own youth on study intentionally. This woman should have alienated any reasonable man, and possibly without forethought.  If Kainé knew what the end of a bloodline could mean to mages, Rin doubted she would have dressed a such a slut and acted as such an asshole.

“Shitstain or not.”  Rin added, “You don’t know Red Eye.  And you don’t know magecraft. I can teach you both.  Don’t expect you can get Yonah back without it.”

Rin turned her gaze to the servants.  Something in Rider’s bearing suggested a loathing to share his kill with anyone, yet his dragon, Red’s, posture pointed towards interest.  Saber seemed relieved.

“You know more than pure magecraft, do you?”  Saber asked.

“More than that I-” Rin found herself stammering, “I- I can fight.  I’d’ve been dead if I was just an academic idiot in the last Grail War.”

That answer satisfied Saber.  She drew herself up to her full height.

“Do it, Nier.  I doubt I will have time to defend and teach you.”

Rin doubted anyone would have the time for both either.  Dedication was written on the boy’s face. Intelligence was debatable.

“In any case, I have a shortcut.” Rin reached into her pockets for her magic gems and found herself crushing buttery cookies between her fingers instead.  She bit back regret. She’d get them to Yonah, Rin promised herself. Rin felt deeper into her pockets and produced a handful of roughly-cut crystals. They were all she could spare to make with her own needs in mind.  They would barely meet the needs of Nier and Kainé alone. The two pocketed a handful of shining red gems from Rin’s hand.

“Show us.”  Kainé said, “If you think we need that sort of magic so bad.”

“You will.  I will, if the one Nier described is who I think she is.”


	6. Emil II

“We rest here.  When we’re ready, we go to the heart of Jericho.”  Illya announced.

Ahead of him, Emil could hear Illya come to a halt.  He was grateful for the break. Long ago, every step had become agony as Emil’s thin slippers chafed his feet raw.  He had not dared to speak up. Illya had never complained once as she led the way with soft, sometimes waltzing steps barely audible over the Weiss’s determined plodding.  They were taking a circuitous and silent route through the remains of Tokyo. Weiss claimed to know where the hotbeds of Legion activity were and what roads had been blocked by fallen buildings.  Past that, he insisted on visiting several more caches for food and other supplies.

 

More than anything, Emil did not want Weiss to think he was weak.  For the last few hours Emil had forced himself to push through the pain, grinding into blisters and trying hard not to limp or wince or give away that anything was amiss through the weight of his hands on the metal canister Weiss had strapped to his back.

“Come on Emil, you can sit here.  Looks like this used to be a cafe.”  Weiss said.

He took Emil’s hand and guided it to the back of a plastic chair.  As he felt around to gain a sense of which way it faced, he could tell it had seen better days.  One arm buckled easily under his fingers, having been broken away from the back. Gingerly he sat down.  His feet felt even more on fire without his weight on them.

“You’re bleeding!”  Weiss exclaimed.

“I am?”  Emil asked.  He knew he hurt, but he hadn’t thought it was that bad.

“Yeah, you idiot!  Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I, um…” Emil stammered. His cheeks grew hot.  For an instant he forgot how badly his feet hurt.

Illya tittered nearby as Weiss wound through the familiar sounds of undoing his gear to find his medical kit.  

“Damn, haven’t you walked a day in your life?  You don’t even have socks... “ Weiss grumbled, pulling off Emil’s slippers and letting them fall to the concrete below.  He turned over Emil’s feet in his hands. “I can’t do much for the blisters but I can clean up and bandage your heels and give you an aspirin.  Or can magecraft do better, Illya?”

“For something that little?  As easy as breathing.”

“Then why aren’t you helping?”

Illya sighed some words.  In an instant Emil’s feet stopped throbbing and burning and felt like they were being bathed in a warm water that washed all the pain away from the bones outward.  “I was waiting to see when you would ask, Hamelin boy.” Illya giggled. “You’re so devoted.”

Weiss let go of Emil and shot up, scraping his shoes against the concrete as he whipped around.  

“And what’s the point of that!?”  Weiss demanded, “We’re a team, aren’t we?  If you see someone hurt, you help them!”

Something in how his voice wavered and cracked struck Emil as defensive, embarrassed.  His heart sank sharply at the realization that either Illya’s opinion mattered that much to Weiss, or Weiss would not want to be anything more than a simple team member to Emil.

_ You didn’t tell me I was bleeding. _ Emil admonished Caster, turning his attention away from wondering about the other masters.

_ I thought my concerns for your wellbeing had been too onerous? _

Caster was right.  Emil had told him not long into their hike that he tired of hearing him warn and wheedle about how many ways he would have to adapt to travelling on foot, interspersed with hints that Emil would be far better served relying on Caster to move ahead, instead of leaning on Weiss.  The last had tried Emil’s patience the most.

_ It’s just that there’s nothing we could do about it.  I would get blisters no matter what. _

_ If we are resting, would you care for music? _

Emil nodded.  The air shifted as Caster manifested beside him.  He heard the scrape of plastic chair legs against concrete and the groan of the chair as his Servant sat down.  He must be tall, Emil thought, he sounded heavy but the face Emil had touched was a lean one. Caster began plucking softly at his lyre, searching for a tune worthy of embellishment.

“Well, I guess magecraft would be good for a fire too, right?  The rations I got are a little better warm.” Weiss suggested.

“Pick your miracles more carefully.  Bandages couldn’t heal Emil like I could.  Matches or a lighter won’t use my mana unnecessarily.”

“Fine.  And they say I’m the smart ass.”

 

Weiss pulled together what sounded like a tiny fire while Illya convinced Caster to sing about Hercules with less effort than Emil expected.  

 

“Weiss, we haven’t met Assassin yet.  Can’t he sit with us?” Emil said.

“Yeah.  Assassin, show yourself.  They’re okay.”

Emil could feel the mana shift around him.  The smell of ash and seaspray from Weiss became overpowered by the freshness of mountain air and a slight hint of sweet apples.  Emil wanted to ask to feel Assassin’s face the way he could feel, and then know, Caster, but at the same time felt too shy. To ask Assassin or Weiss himself felt embarrassingly personal.

_ Caster, can you see Assassin? _ Emil asked instead.

_I can._   Caster said with an appreciative purr, still plucking at his lyre.  _He’s taller than I am.  A great golden beard and blue eyes._ _Green tunic, tight across his arms, and leather boots._ _He has a crossbow on his back.  A quiver with one arrow. Ah, Emil, if you could see Assassin…_

“Who is he?”  Emil asked Weiss directly.  “You know I have Orpheus and Illya had Hercules.  It’s not fair if we don’t know Assassin.”

Emil could feel Caster want to correct him yet again for asking a Servant’s name, but only just.

“I will remain ‘Assassin’.”  A gravelly baritone announced, “For all the good it did Berserker to be known as Hercules.”

The tone of voice was almost at odds with the reverence Caster described Assassin with.  With Caster’s words Emil expected a bold lion of a man. Assassin himself revealed a haggard old cat, as tired with its role in life as Weiss was with his.  Were Servants so much like their Masters? Emil wondered. Could he be as passionate a dreamer as Caster? And was Illya the driven beast that Hercules had been?

Something in Emil told himself it was true.  Weiss should have been nothing more than a normal boy but was pushed to a life that denied it, yet he fought for every moment of humanity. He wondered where that left him in relation to Caster.

“Are you eating with us, Assassin?” Weiss asked, “I can warm up another meal.”

“A little would not go amiss.”  Assassin said.  

 

He sat down by Caster, across from Illya.   After a short time, Emil could hear the sound of bubbling over the crackle of the campfire.  It grew louder as Weiss handed a tin of food to Emil. The smell of it was overwhelming and less than appetizing.  He wrinkled his nose.

“Trust me, this is better than cold.  Smell and taste. At least you don’t have to see how awful it looks.”

“Which is?”

“It’s supposed to be beef stew.  Lila told me it used to not be so grey a few years ago.”

“What happened to Lila?”

“She’s dead, same as everyone else in my squad.”  Weiss said with a sudden leadenness to his voice, as if a part of him had died too, “She was a tough bastard too, made it all the way to sixteen before she turned into Legion.  What, you think I’d have been alone when I found you if I had a choice?”

“I’m sorry.”

“What for?  You didn’t kill her, did you?”  Weiss asked, jarringly back to his normal self.

“N-no…”

Weiss passed out meals to the rest.  Emil found a fork on one side of the meal tray and started picking at the stew, too nervous that he might spill some on himself and too embarrassed for having touched a nerve in Weiss.  He hadn’t felt so small and mortal even watching Hercules die.

 

_ Are you alright, Caster? _ Emil asked,  _ I heard during the fight- _

He heard two strings on Caster’s lyre snap, but he had seen Illya. He saw her through a filmy bubble of magic and she did not turn to stone.  Illya did not look much older than Emil, though she was dressed for heavy winter and he only had thin hospital clothes. At first she looked like a porcelain doll, so primly dressed in a dark purple coat with snow-white hair that reached past her shoulders.  Her red eyes streamed with tears from Caster’s song even as her mouth was set hard with a mix of determination and haughtiness. He saw and heard the moment when she let loose a primal scream of despair as Hercules fell, a moment that moved Illya to a real sorrow, one that was beyond tears.  Then Weiss had told him that he could cover his eyes once more. The battle was over.

Emil ached that he could have had a chance to see Weiss the same way, even if it was through the mirror or out of the corner of his eye.  There was so much he wanted to know beyond the sound of his voice and the smell of salt and ash and the sound of the rattling of metal on leather and the thuds of leather on earth that came with Weiss’ presence.  Perhaps Illya could teach him whatever spell she used to create her barrier. Caster had certainly warmed to her after whatever secret she shared with him. Of course, asking Caster to describe Weiss as he had described Assassin was an option, but not one Emil seriously considered.  Some things were important enough to experience first-hand, if it was to be ever at all.

 

_ I will survive.   _ Caster asserted.   _ Give me merely one string, and I will still give you a symphony.  Leave me less than that, and you still have my song. _

_ You’re not worried?  It took both you and Assassin to kill Berserker.  What about the others? _

_ Illya told me about Red Eye. _ Caster said with full confidence,  _ That is all we need to worry about. _

_ No one else?  How many Masters are there? _

_ No.  Do not concern yourself with them. _

_ But-- _

“Hey, Emil.”  Weiss interrupted Emil’s thoughts, “If you’re not hungry enough to eat, wanna go for a walk?  I bet we could find a store with socks and shoes for you.”

“You don’t want to look with Illya?”

“Nah.  If I had to leave someone alone, it’d be her.”

“You think she’s more capable than me.”

“Well, yeah.  But… Let’s go.  Assassin, watch after her.  Tell me if something happens and we’ll be back.”

Weiss grabbed Emil’s hand forcefully, pulling him to his feet.  The two boys wound their way through streets with some purpose. Though they made wide circles around what Emil guessed, by the the amount of gravel he kicked before each turn, were collapsed buildings, Weiss pulled Emil along quickly as if he knew where he was looking.

“What were you going to say about Illya?”  Emil asked when he was sure Illya was out of earshot.  He hadn’t heard her light footsteps behind them, nor could she send Berserker after them to listen in.  

“I don’t know what to think about her yet.  She is with us for now, but she actually believes this Grail War stuff.  She attacked us first.”

“Do you think she’s pretty?”

“Pretty?  What does that matter?  I guess it’d be easier to say if I knew what side she was on.  Or if I could figure I’d be around in a few years; seems like she’s been around the block a bit.  Why? What do you think?”

“She’s not that special.”

“You did see her, didn’t you?  I’d thought if she was the one girl you’ve met you’d be bowled over, but guess not.  Picky, huh?”

Unmaterialized, Caster laughed gently.  It was a sound that wrapped itself comfortingly around Emil’s mind, assuring him that the laugh was not at his expense, but at Weiss’.

Emil thought to Caster,  _ He doesn’t get it, does he?  _ As he said to Weiss, “Picky.  Yes. What if there wasn’t a Grail War?”

“No Grail War and no Legion, maybe I’d ask her to go out with me.  Nice evening in the park after school, like I used to do but romantic.”

Just in time, a shadow fell over Emil, sapping away what little warmth the weak sun provided.  He and Weiss slowed to a stop, and Weiss broke away from him. Emil heard the sounds of Weiss kicking broken glass away from an abandoned storefront.  He was doing it kindly, Emil guessed, so that the shards wouldn’t pierce his slippers, but no matter how much he knew that to be the reality, Emil felt like he had entered a dark and lonely future and Weiss was only abusing the shards of a broken heart.

“This is the store.”  Weiss announced, taking Emil’s hand once more, “Looks pretty well cleaned out, but I’m sure we’ll find something.”

 

Emil took a seat on the carpeted floor, picking at an unknown years’ amount of gathered grit and debris while Weiss rifled through shelves.  Again, he was direct in his actions. Even if he threw boxes or even individual shoes to the floor at times, Weiss strayed little from the first area he searched.

“Try these.”  Weiss said, pushing a roll of socks and a heavy pair of shoes into Emil’s hands.  The surprising weight dropped his hands into his lap. The socks were easy enough to put on.  Emil put one shoe on the floor in front of him while he felt over second. The thick rubber soles were caked with dried mud, and the leather uppers cracked and scuffed.  On one end the lace had lost its aglet and finished instead in an irregular knob of melted plastic. Emil slipped it over one foot, smiling that he had guessed right. The other followed without issue.

Emil pushed himself to his feet and tested the feel.  These shoes held him tightly, not like the slippers he had before.  With the socks in between, even the sturdy leather uppers wouldn’t chafe his ankles.  The insole curved strangely against his foot, unwelcoming, as if it expected another owner.  

“They fit?”  Weiss asked, waiting for Emil to nod, “They’re used, but they’re good Hamelin shoes.  Not civilian crap. Lots of us grow out of what we’re issued in the field. Or we don’t get the chance.  Come on, I’m worried about Illya.”

 

He had taken only two steps before all of a sudden, the earth began to shake and roll beneath Emil’s feet, throwing him to his hands and knees.  Around him the whole building groaned along with the earth. Everything within the store crashed to the ground around Emil, and he found himself showered with falling pieces of ceiling and boxes and shoes from the shelves.  Emil groped for Weiss, anxious to make sure that he would be alright. For a moment he was sure that they would die there, crushed beneath the collapsing floors above them. Emil did not want to die alone. His blind fingers found the other boy and grasped his hand tightly.  

Weiss pulled himself close to Emil, so close that their foreheads touched.  The smell of salt and ash had never been so strong. Emil took comfort in it as debris rained down on the two.  For Emil each piece that struck him was a sharp pain. They sounded like rain on a tin roof as they battered the metal canister on Weiss’ back.  It was a faraway sound that he couldn’t recall ever first hearing, but that reminded him of a time when he was in the arms of someone older, safe from a storm.

The mana shifted around him and Emil heard Weiss shout, barely audible above the earthquake, “No, Assassin, go back to Illya!”

Caster lost no time taking his place.  He materialized above Emil and Weiss, shielding both with his body as he lifted his voice above the roar of groaning earth and falling concrete.

He sang to the ground beneath them, urging it on with furious plucking of his lyre’s remaining strings.  He reminded the earth of when it had once accepted him alive, and begged it to do so once more. Caster wove a story of a woman he loved more dearly than life itself, and how she was stolen away to the underworld.  He praised the ground beneath them and all its wealth, and promised that if it could bring him closer once more to Eurydice, if it could protect the two precious children at his side, the earth between Heaven and Hell would have never been so rich since Demeter and Persephone both walked the world together all year long.

The world around them continued to roar uneasily, but Emil felt himself and Weiss be lowered easily below into the fretful earth.  Only once was Caster’s song interrupted, and with a sickening sound concrete struck both the Servant and his lyre. In that moment, another string broke under Caster’s fingers.  Drops of something thick and salty and wet fell against Emil’s cheek and rolled down his chin. Emil held Weiss’ hand so tightly the other boy’s fingers were cold beneath his. 

It would be okay, Emil told himself, if Caster died to protect himself and Weiss.  It was Emi’s will and Caster’s bond. It would be okay if Assassin died the same. Past then, Emil would do anything he could for Weiss.  Weiss remembered a world to live for.

 

The roar of earth, steel and concrete lessened.  The ground beneath Emil and Weiss let them down gently onto cold tile.  Everything around Emil was black and sunless. In the streets he could tell light and shadow, but here there was nothing.  Emil pushed himself to his knees. Surprisingly, Weiss failed to do the same.

 

“Emil, I can’t see here.”  Weiss said, his voice shaking, “It’s too dark.”

Weiss’ voice echoed around Emil.  His quavering fear told Emil all he needed to know.  There was a wall to one side, a chasm to another. Ahead, a breeze told Emil that there was a place where this world once more connected to the surface.

“It’s okay.”  Emil said. He rose to his feet and tugged Weiss upwards to do the same.  “I think I can lead us.”

_ Caster, you can’t help Weiss, can you? _

_ There’s nothing for me to sing to life.  No candles, no lightbulbs to make blush. _

_ Are you alright?  You sound distracted- _

_ I lost another string. _   Caster said coldly.   _ It would not have happened if I did not need to protect the boy as well as you. _

_ Can you sing?  Or play your lyre?  If you do that, I can know where we are.  I think. _

_ What song would you wish, Emil? _

_ Any.   _ Emil thought before reconsidering,  _ Something easy and open.  Save your strength, please, Caster. _

Caster plucked the remaining strings of his lyre.  He saved his strength in singing, but the very notes he plucked told of one in love with his own image, and another unable to express their longing for the first.  By these notes, Emil found his way to a cold tiled wall, and from this was able to follow the wind towards a way out. This time it was Weiss’ hand on Emil’s shoulder.  Emil had never before wanted a long journey to be yet longer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I dunno if any of you are trying to guess who Assassin is after this, but here's your definitive clue and my stupid coincidence that led me here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Book_of_Sarnen


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